


a sound is still a sound around no one

by mysteriesofloves



Category: Gossip Girl (TV 2007)
Genre: Character Study, F/F, One-Sided Relationship
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-05-27
Updated: 2020-05-27
Packaged: 2021-03-03 03:55:40
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,279
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24398386
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/mysteriesofloves/pseuds/mysteriesofloves
Summary: I wrote this so long ago and truly have no idea what I was planning on doing with it, but I just found it and I like it so I’m publishing it. I don’t know what this is!Trigger warning for eating disorders.
Relationships: Serena van der Woodsen/Blair Waldorf
Comments: 9
Kudos: 52





	a sound is still a sound around no one

**Author's Note:**

> I wrote this so long ago and truly have no idea what I was planning on doing with it, but I just found it and I like it so I’m publishing it. I don’t know what this is! 
> 
> Trigger warning for eating disorders.

They steal from Lily’s always stocked, never ending liquor cabinet. Blair doesn’t like the taste of alcohol, turns her nose up at it. But Serena loves it, loves the way different bottles make her feel. She pours Blair glass of red wine after glass of red wine. It makes them feel so grown up.

 _I don’t think we like each other the same way_. Blair slurs. 

Serena looks at her in the mirror, blots gloss over her pink stained mouth.

 _I’ve always been so jealous of your lips_. Serena says, _every lipstick looks so good on you._

Blair’s reflection behind her in the mirror is hazy. 

_Every lipstick looks good on you, too._

_Do you believe in fate?_ Blair says. Serena isn’t listening. _I do but I don’t want to. Because that’s not how this ends, is it? With you and me? That’s never how it ends._

They’re fifteen and they sit around a hotel room, music so loud Blair can’t hear her own thoughts. Serena’s head whips back, once, twice, three times. 

She hears Chuck's voice, chanting _kiss, kiss, kiss. Just for us. You know you want to._

Serena’s hand is on the back of her head, and then her lips are on hers. Her mouth is wet and sour. By the time Blair closes her eyes, she’s already gone. 

The photo gets posted later that night. Blair sneaks into her mother’s bathroom, takes one of her sleeping pills, just so she doesn’t have to think.

She looks through a photo album, editorials of a young Eleanor gleaming up at her from the pages. They look alike, sure, but Eleanor has something, a charm about her, that Blair doesn’t see when she looks in the mirror. 

Blair’s knees are too knobby and her arms are too short and her face is too round - all things she can’t change. 

Eleanor’s hands are always finding Blair’s stomach, poking at her thighs, as she dresses her up in the clothes she designs, like her own blueprint. The mark Eleanor will leave on the world. 

Serena finds her propped up against the toilet, the cold tile of the floor pressed against her bare legs. She hears her fumble with the shower handle, turning it off. Serena’s hands are hot on her back, on her arms and shoulders. She pulls her up the way Blair had pulled her up time and time again. She presses a chapstick kiss to her forehead.

 _I did it to myself_ , Blair says.

 _Why? Why would you do this?_ She barely hears her, the words tangled into Blair’s hair. She doesn’t answer, just wipes her mouth on the back of her hand. She rinses her mouth out, but when she looks up into Serena’s reddened eyes, the putrid taste is still there.

 _You’re so pretty,_ she says, later that night, when they lie face to face on Blair’s bed in the dark. She’d washed Blair’s hair, double conditioned and brushed and blow dried, the way Blair always did for her. _I just want to be pretty like you._

 _You’re the prettiest person I’ve ever met,_ Serena says. Blair likes it when Serena means what she’s saying. That’s something that’s always been hard for Blair. 

Serena paints her knuckles with concealer to cover the bruises, and paints her nails with polish just because she wants to. 

_Here_ , Serena says, _now when they take your picture it’ll be hidden._

 _Our little secret_ , Blair says lowly. Serena lets go of her hand when she finishes the last coat. She never holds on for too long. 

Every time she walks back out of the big glass doors she expects Serena to not be there anymore. But she always is, one leg crossed over the other, sitting on a dirty ledge, teeth digging into the skin around her nails until bits of blood come through.

 _Good?_ Serena says, and she never asks more. 

_Yes_. Blair says, and then, _I love you_. but it comes out as, _Let’s go._

When Blair’s father leaves, she spends a week in Serena’s bed. 

_It’ll be okay,_ Serena says, combing Blair’s hair. _Just think about it as another thing we share._

They stand together, cramped in the small dressing room, a blur of silk and lace. Blair keeps her back to Serena, not exposing her stomach, her chest, the way her eyes are wandering. 

They step out to show the boys, and Blair doesn’t see the way Nate looks at Serena, because she’s looking at Serena too. 

_Look at you two_ , Chuck says, half-drunk in the middle of the day, lying on his stomach, his fingers trailing the floor. _Thelma and Louise. One day you’re going to fall so hard it’ll crack the both of you open._

Three weeks later, Serena leaves without her. She doesn’t even say goodbye. Blair doesn’t walk through the glass doors again.

Blair had spent a lot of time watching the way people looked at Serena. They seemed to all be variations of the same thing - the way the gods had looked upon Aphrodite as she rose from the sea. 

Blair would never have that, and so instead turned those who gazed upon her to stone.

They stop talking about Serena, like she doesn’t exist. Blair starts to think that maybe she never did. 

But she slips back through the veil with ease, and the cold, harsh light that had been brandished upon Blair in her absence returns to its rightful owner. Blair is left with only a breeze. 

They’ve lost track of where the fights start, and where they end. Maybe they never really do end. Nate would laugh and say _It’ll be okay. You two fight like an old married couple._

_You’re a fucking bitch,_ Blair spits. _You go through people so fast that one day you’re going to end up dead in a ditch somewhere and no one will know, no one will care, because you’ll have already left us all behind._

It doesn’t take long for Blair to come back, crying, apologies spilling out of her. Serena takes her in her arms. It isn’t the end, it’s just a pause between. 

Dan looks at her in a way that makes her think, maybe, it’s meant only for her. She is not made of sea foam. She is made of glass. Dan kisses her cracks, holds them together. He‘ll make her fall apart, just as easily. 

_Dan? My Dan?_ Serena says incredulously. _All of a sudden you want Dan?_

 _Just think of it as another thing we share,_ Blair says, and the blank look in her eyes tells her that Serena doesn’t remember her own words. 

Serena flips her hair over her shoulder, smiles tentatively, and Blair knows she’s the love of her life. She’s never hated her more. 

Serena’s mother never expected anything of her because she was never really a mother herself. Serena got every boy she wanted, whenever she wanted them. Serena didn’t have to stick her fingers down her throat to feel pretty. Serena took everything from her. But she chooses Serena. Time and time again, she chooses Serena.

Serena takes a sip of her coffee. She bats her eyelashes. 

She had always wanted Serena to choose her. Even just once. 

_Do you believe in fate?_ Blair says. She’s blown out all the candles, put the flowers away in their vases, thrown out the discarded gift wrap. They’ve married the people they were supposed to marry. It’s supposed to be the beginning, but it feels like the end.

 _I don’t know,_ Serena says. _Maybe_. 

_How else do you suppose we made it here?_ Blair says. _Still together after everything?_

Serena shrugs. _Because we chose to be._

  
  


**Author's Note:**

> Title from I Want You To Love Me by Fiona Apple


End file.
